


Look Not With the Eyes

by asael



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-29 14:58:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3900514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asael/pseuds/asael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam allows himself to look, just for a moment. It’s only fair. Ronan looks at him all the time, he should be able to look back once or twice.</p><p>He doesn’t know what he’s looking for, he just knows that he wants to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Look Not With the Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Much thanks to bucketmouse for being my beta & being very inspiring. Title is from Shakespeare - "Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind".

Adam is bent over his trig homework when he feels the warm weight of Ronan’s eyes on him. Again. Is Ronan actually studying, or has this all just been an excuse to watch the Adam Show - one program across all channels, only entertaining if you like watching tired schoolboys try and fail to do their math homework?

Adam isn’t going to ask. He’s fairly certain he already knows the answer, although it still doesn’t make any sense to him. Ronan is _Ronan_ , a sharp-edged, shark-smiling boy who no one can take their eyes off of. The entirety of Aglionby is either terrified of or half in love with Ronan, sometimes both at the same time. Adam sees how they look at Ronan, sees the singular spot that Ronan occupies in the world.

There’s no one quite like him, and not because he’s the Greywaren. It’s because of the way he confronts the world, full of devil-may-care attitude and a deep center of decency. Plenty of people stop at the surface, but Adam has been lucky enough to see more - Ronan with Chainsaw, Ronan at the Barns, trying so hard, so loyal and faithful to Gansey. Ronan is the kind of guy who would punch a cop for his friends without a moment’s hesitation, and sometimes Adam is shocked that that hasn’t happened yet.

Still kind of an asshole, sure, but without a doubt the best asshole Adam’s ever known. And he’s known a lot.

But what does that mean for Adam, when he’s the one Ronan has chosen to rest his eyes on? Adam isn’t sure, Adam doesn’t know, who _could_? It’s Ronan, who Cabeswater loves, who’s content to do nothing but look even though Adam knows he must want more, they’re teenage boys for Christ’s sake, even he - under threat of torture, perhaps - would have to admit to a dream or two involving Ronan’s strong hands on his skin, Ronan’s lips on his throat. But those are dreams, no one can control their dreams. 

Almost no one.

But it’s _Ronan_ , beyond all that, the shithead who’s ready to fight the world, the one person who looks at Adam and isn’t disgusted by what he is or concerned about what he’s becoming. When Ronan’s eyes are on Adam, sometimes Ronan looks almost smug, like he’s thinking, _See? This is my friend. He’s a magician, he’s more than you ever thought he was, but I knew all along, because I was watching him. Because I saw more._

Did he? What does he really see, when he looks at Adam? Does he see the dark circles under Adam’s eyes, the long hours of exhaustion caused by juggling three jobs, school, and the search for Gansey’s lost Welsh king? Does he see the scars, the times his father’s careless blows broke skin, the cigarette burns? Does he see the truth - does Ronan see trailer trash with big dreams, crawling vermin who pretends he can ever be anything but that?

Or does he see more?

He must. There’s no way Ronan could look at him that way if Ronan saw Adam the way Adam sees himself.

On the floor, Ronan scoffs in disgust and pushes his books away, as if he’d actually been doing homework. They both know that’s not true, but they both keep up the polite fiction as if it means anything. He throws himself to the floor, Adam’s floorboards spotless but creaking, and stretches out like he means to fall asleep right there.

It wouldn’t be the first time.

Adam allows himself to look, just for a moment. It’s only fair. Ronan looks at him all the time, he should be able to look back once or twice.

He doesn’t know what he’s looking for, he just knows that he wants to. Ronan’s gaze is like a weight on him, is it the same the other way around? If he looks hard enough, can he see what Ronan sees when he looks at Adam?

He can’t. He only sees Ronan, that familiar, savagely handsome face, the jawline that’s gritted half the time, the broad shoulders and long-fingered hands that are never greasy or dirty like Adam’s, not unless he wants them to be. Ronan is flawless, even when he’s tried to make himself flawed, the tattoo peeking out around his shoulders and neck. It’s part of him, it’s right, and someday Adam would like to trace its lines and find out what secrets Ronan has hidden in there.

He thinks Ronan wouldn’t mind. He thinks that if he asked, Ronan would look at him askance, huff some kind of insult or inappropriate comment - _fuck, man, didn’t know you wanted to get your hands all over me so bad_ \- but then he’d shrug, turn away, pull off his shirt.

Adam has seen Ronan’s back before. Adam’s always heard that Catholics are full of shame, but Ronan barely seems to have a nodding acquaintance with the word. He has no problem stripping his shirt off, changing in front of him or Gansey or Noah, lounging around half-undressed if it gets too hot. Adam’s never been able to do that, too aware of his own vulnerability. Clothing is armor, the right clothing even more so. He’s strangely envious of Ronan’s ability to not care.

So he’s seen Ronan’s tattoo, but he’s never really _seen_ it. All its curves and sharp angles, its thorns and intricacies. Pure art, fitting for the body it’s been traced on.

Because Adam is not blind. He knows exactly how attractive Ronan is. Sometimes it’s made him jealous - he will never have that dark charisma, that strange quality that draws the eye. That draws Adam’s eyes. _Wantable._ It might be a word for Adam, but only in Ronan’s eyes. Ronan is that always. Who wouldn’t want him?

He’s not the sort of person who should ever look at Adam that way, but he does. Adam might be imagining it, he tells himself that sometimes, and he’s not sure whether he’s trying to comfort himself or upset himself. He knows where he belongs (trash, hick, nothing), and it’s not in Ronan’s eyes. But there he is, and he wonders how often Ronan thinks about touching him.

Ronan’s hands are certain of themselves, masterful when they’re on a gearshift, sometimes clenched into fists but more often, when Adam’s around these days, loose and relaxed. Adam watches them sometimes, he watches them right now, and wonders what those sure fingers would feel like against his skin. Would Ronan, who stalks through life ready to throw a punch at any time, curl his fingers into Adam’s skin with that hidden gentleness he has? 

Adam has been touched without violence so rarely that it’s hard to imagine, but he does. He thinks about Ronan’s fingers sliding across his skin, wrapping around his wrist, burning a hot trail along the jut of his hipbone. He thinks it wouldn’t be so bad, really, if Ronan were a little less careful. Not if it were the two of them.

He thinks about how Ronan might kiss. Does Ronan want to kiss him, does he think about it? Would he throw all of himself into it, or would he be careful, uncertain, maybe not wanting to frighten Adam away? Adam thinks that he doesn’t know Ronan as well as he wishes. He’s not sure, and for a moment, just a moment, he can almost feel Ronan’s lips on him. Hungry and wanting, maybe a hand would settle on Adam’s neck, holding him there, skin against skin. Adam could slip a finger into the loop of Ronan’s fashionably battered jeans, pull him closer, deepen the kiss, open his lips for Ronan and give him whatever desires might be hiding behind all those glances.

He realizes suddenly that he doesn’t know how long he’s been staring at Ronan’s lips.

He has no idea how his thoughts ended up down this twisting alleyway, this strange path that dead-ends in a place he never quite expected to go.

Ronan opens his eyes.

For a moment, they stare at each other, and Ronan’s mouth opens as if he’s about to say something, but Adam speaks first.

“At least take a blanket if you’re going to pass out on my floor.”

It seems safest, the first thing he could think of, and he tears his eyes away, pulling the blanket off his bed. There’s no way Ronan knows Adam was staring at him, he thinks, and steadfastly ignores all the times he’s felt Ronan’s eyes on him without looking.

He pushes the blanket at Ronan, and Ronan tries to shove it back.

“What the hell, Parrish, you think you’re my mother now? I don’t need your shitty blanket.”

Adam frowns and pushes it at him again, the edge catching on the corner of his crappy bed frame and overbalancing him. He almost falls forward, off the bed, but Ronan - of course - grabs his forearm, balancing him, catching him before he can fall. Ronan’s leaned forward to do it, and they’re close, Adam hanging off the edge of the bed and Ronan pressed against it, stretched up toward him.

He can feel Ronan’s hand on his skin, sending shivers along his nerve endings thanks to those thoughts he’s just had, the ones about kissing Ronan.

Has he really been thinking about _kissing Ronan_?

“Take the blanket and go to sleep, asshole,” Adam says, proud of himself when his voice barely wavers, when there’s no external sign of his internal conflict. He straightens up, pulls his arm away - perhaps more gently than he should have - and shoves the blanket in Ronan’s face. Ronan takes it, rolling his eyes.

“Whatever, Parrish,” he says, and lays down, pulling the blanket over himself and turning away. “Just don’t fucking fall on me in the middle of the night.” There’s a faint red flush on the tips of his ears, the back of his neck, and Adam drags his eyes away, laying down himself, pulling his thin sheet over him.

His heart is thumping a quick drumbeat against his ribs. For a moment he’d almost - he’s not ready. Not now. Maybe not ever.

But that ‘maybe’ is what shakes him even more. Because Adam does not always understand himself, can’t always get inside his own head, but once he knows something he can’t ignore it. And now he knows that he just spent five minutes fantasizing about kissing Ronan Lynch, and every part of it was amazing, and none of it was a dream.

He closes his eyes, sending out an aimless prayer that he doesn’t have any embarrassing dreams tonight, with Ronan on the floor not five feet away. Perhaps, for once, the universe will take pity on him.


End file.
